Welcome to My Least Favorite Parts of Spooky Season

I have happily shared with you guys my love of the Halloween season. The beautiful colors of the falling leaves, the creepy yet fun decorations, and the wonderful things to eat are all wonderful. I'm fond of seeing all the little kids in their costumes and their excitement going trick or treating. 

However, I must admit that there are a few things about this time of year that either get on my nerves or cause me distress. It's not all sugar and spice and everything delightfully spooky this time of year and here are are a few of mine. 

Haunted House Mazes 

Some of you might be surprised that I'm not a fan of these pop up attractions - especially since I've been noted to enjoy Buschgardens Hall-o-Scream. Except I can't stand the sensory overload that is the haunted house (or haunted maze as my family always called them). From an overstimulation of noise, and overuse of strobe lights, to lots of fake fog to trigger my asthma, and the over use of jump scares, I just don't enjoy this experience. If I am somehow talked into (or blackmailed into) entering one of these monstrosities, I typically will be walking with my ears covered - much to the confusion of everyone but my family. These are great for some people, but not so much for me.

The only Haunted House I do enjoy is the one at Disney World/Disneyland.

Fake Chain Saws

Similar to Haunted House Mazes, these beyond evil noise makers never fail to freak me out. If you want to see me jump about a foot in the air, rev up a real chain saw in my general vicinity. I guarantee you a freaked out reaction. So if I can't handle the real ones, why would I like the fake ones often used in theme park scare zones or outside Haunted House Maze attractions. I hate them with the fiery passion of a thousand suns.  

Zombies

First of all, the modern "zombie" is actually more of a traditional ghoul. The origin of zombies comes from Haitian and Caribbean voodoo (or Vodou) which is an actual religious practice. Most depictions of Vodou zombies in western media are wrong and insulting to the practitioners of voodoo/Vodou. Depictions of the more ghoul like zombie freak me out and the fact that the US military has a plan in place for when a zombie out break occurs doesn't help with my irrational fears. I'm not sure if it's the amount of violence associated with zombies or the sheer mindlessness of their existence that cause my skin to crawl more. Zombies are a big no thank you.

Fun Fact: I was once asked in college if I'd survive a zombie apocalypses. Before I could answer and without skipping a beat, my college roommate goes: "they'd die." Alas, my college roommate is probably right.

Harming of Animals

Sadly, Halloween and spooky season is also associated with the mindless harm of animals - especially black cats. Some of my friends growing up had a black cat and their family always made sure to securely lock the kitty away on Halloween for fear that someone would harm her. It's not cool to harm animals on Halloween for a prank or try to commune with the devil. 

PSA - keep all cats and dogs inside on Halloween, especially if they have black fur.

Overly Sexual Costumes for Children

Why is this a thing?

Pumpkin Spice Flavored Hate

I get that it's everywhere. I get that some people are totally put off by it. But I enjoy it and I don't care if that makes me "basic". Pumpkin spice and everything nice is a wonderful part of this season. The haters can go have their hate party in another part of the Internet.

And Finally: The Glorification of Serial Killers

I have a question - are TikTokers who watch the glamorized dramatization "documentaries" of serial kills and claim that they weren't disturbed okay? No, seriously, are you okay? It's one thing to enjoy watching Freddy or Jason or Michael Meyers on the big screen. It's an entirely different can of worms if you can watch media on real life evil people and not want to vomit. Please stop encouraging the glorification of people who have done horrific things to other people. Families of victims don't deserve this. The victims of these crimes don't deserve this. I honestly wish that these people would fade away from public consciousness. We don't need any more of these "documentaries" dropping around Halloween time (or ever).

I love the Halloween season and enjoy some of the spooky things that come with it. But as much as I love "all things spooky", there are a few draw backs. However, I can (usually) avoid the things I don't enjoy. 

You can find me this season hanging out in a pumpkin patch or exploring a corn maze (I promise to only sacrifice one family to the corn). I also enjoy seeing the cool decorations - minus any loud noises or jump scares. 

What are your favorite parts of the Halloween season? Have any least favorite things about the season?

If you enjoyed this post (or it really pissed you off) please like, share, and/or leave a comment. I love hearing from my readers and I hope y'all like hearing from me.

Until next week. 

Welcome to Mischief Night

Happy night before Halloween or All Hallows' Eve otherwise known as Mischief Night.  Back when my mom was a kid (or heck go back to when my grandfather was a kid), this was the night that the kids would play tricks on their neighbors. Stuff like throwing toilet paper in trees were some of the pranks that were pulled. 

Now, not so much and that's probably a good thing. However I have seen a recent trend of people talking about how different Halloween has become over the past few decades or so. In some places, kids no longer trick or treat at all. They instead go to the local mall, a school, or a trunk or treat event (when I was a kid if these were options we'd just do as many as we could in addition to traditional trick or treating).

I'll be honest I was one of those kids who dressed up and went trick or treating until I was about 16 years old (I also looked like I was about 12) and it was always a blast. We'd walk around the neighborhood in group of 5 or 6 kids with an adult not that far behind us. Sometimes people would have amazing decorations up that we'd run through giggling. Other times a neighbor would be hidden near the candy bowl and move to scare us when we least suspected it.

We knew we were never in any real danger, especially with  our parents egging us on to ring the doorbell of the really scary houses. There was one year when I was 7 that I scared a neighbor's kids so badly that they refused to go trick or treating. I was dressed as a vampire and had fake blood dripping down my chin.

Halloween as a kid was the best!

As an adult Halloween can be fun, but it depends on what to do. I've always been excited to pass out candy to trick or treaters, except in all the areas that I lived, there weren't any. Most kids went trick or treating at the above mentioned approved places. I might get some this year, but I don't know for certain.

As an adult, I have the option of going to haunted houses, going out and partying, staying in and watching scary movies, or all three. I've spent most of the season going through my Halloween movie collection.

Haunted Houses are another aspect of Halloween that I think has changed a lot. I remember the first year that Buschgardens hosted Hallowscream. It was really cool, if very crowded. Now every theme park seems to have Halloween attractions at night during October. Then there are the haunted houses, hay rides, and corn mazes that crop up only for this time of year. They can range from the sort of cheesy to the OMG I can't believe I signed a waiver to do this.

I actually don't like haunted houses. I'm not that big of a fan of gory horror movies either, but the campy ones with Vincent Price are always worth a viewing. As much as I like the decorations and atmosphere at Halloween, I'm not into getting the stuffing scared out of me by a guy wielding a chainsaw. I'd rather be outside dressed up as a silly spook begging my neighbors for free candy.

But since it's not socially acceptable for me to go trick or treating anymore, I'm going to enjoy watching old horror movies on Hulu while Elvira gives her snarky commentary.

Stay safe everyone. Have a happy Halloween. And if you guys do celebrate Devil's/Mischief Night, try not to do any actual damage and clean up any small pranks.

Someone smashed the pumpkins :(

Until next week.

If you enjoyed this post (or it really pissed you off), please like, share, and/or leave a comment. I love hearing from my readers and I hope you guys like hearing from me.

Cue the evil laughter.